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I certainly don't mean to suggest that every ne who disliked/hated any of the films is in with the alt right.Just that the alt right tis getting really fucking loud about the whole thing and ignoring it seems kind of, I dunno, willfully ignorant.

Edit: People think Holdo was unrealistic? Doesn;t she spend most of the film fucking up?

The loudest voices garner the most attention, because they tend to be shocking/attention drawing, and media focuses on shocking in order to generate views/clicks/revenue. The same issue has more and more dominated politics in the past 20-30 years, to the point that we have a party of dangerous radicals masquerading as conservatives in this country.

The problem with the alt-right's critiques is that they are dominating the conversation. I'm rooting for TLJ's box office simply so that these idiots can't gloat over "lost revenue" due to their -ism bullshit. And personally, I liked TLJ far moreso than TFA, as it contains some seriously breathtaking moments and real drama vis-a-vis Rey/Kylo... but there are some really, really, really mindbogglingly stupid creative decisions that threaten to derail the whole enterprise, decisions that should have been ironed out in the first/second draft stages. I liked Rose & the actress who portrays her; pity they gave her and Finn such a throwaway sequence. Canto Bight could have been incredible -- a serious examination of the profit mechanics underlying these 'star wars' -- instead of a Disneyland wet fart. Why have Holdo at all, and have the conflict between Leia and Poe simplify and strengthen the narrative? Etc., Etc.

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In a scene directly mentored by a Jedi master, and inconsistently, but sure. He can use the Force. Obi-wan guides him into how to start doing it. After ANH, Luke spends 2-3 years knowing he can use the Force, and seemingly made efforts to explore what that meant.

Who taught Rey anything? Who mentored her? No one, apparently. She just starts doing Force stuff because. This post-Lucas Rebels show apparently makes this canonically okay, though, as the Ezra kid apparently is the same. So Rey's not really special in the new canon. Fine. I find it weird, but this may go into HE's commentary of a radical reconceptualization of things for the 21st century, a rejection of knowledge and experience as traditional or conservative constructs.

Yes, Obi Wan used two lines of dialog and Luke is blocking shots blindfolded. Seems like a reasonable thing. In the same way, Ren taught Rey how to do things like force pulls and mind tricks, using almost exactly the same amount of dialog and training.

Another way to say it is this: every single thing that Rey does using the force she sees someone else do before her, or someone else is explicitly mentoring her on how to do (Luke with the meditation and reaching out as an example). This is not any different than the amount of training Luke gets from Obi-Wan.

13 minutes ago, Ran said:

I can blow up stuff in a B-29's turret pretty well on the computer...

I mean, I'm not going to go crazy over the idea that someone with some practical gunnery skill (which Luke explicitly has, as noted in the film!) will figure out point->shoot and will understand leading his target.

Okay, that's cool. Now do it with a rotating turret that you've never used and a targeting computer that was bought from Radio Shack from 1976. Why is it weird that you can do that, but Rey can't fly the Falcon despite tinkering with it for years?

13 minutes ago, Ran said:

Kind of assumed farmers in the wilds of Tatooine know how to defend themselves from Tusken raiders and the like.

Sure, and I kind of assumed that Rey had played with a piloting simulator. Neither were shown in the movie though, and Luke's only encounter with Raiders gets him knocked hard on his ass.

13 minutes ago, Ran said:

FWIW, I don't have an issue with Rey knowing how to fight. I had more of an issue with non-Force users wielding lightsabers effectively without training, but I guess it was an EU thing that it took a Jedi's Force-sensitivity leading to self- and environmental awareness sufficient to be able to safely use one without accidentally chopping off some of your own bits when swinging a weapon with a weightless "blade". And her defeating Kylo Ren felt a bit too easy to me, even knowing his injury and emotional distraction having killed his father and so on, but that's a very small thing. It was more that it fit into all this other stuff she was doing that, put together, didn't seem to have any explanation beyond the fact that it was a clue that there was more to her than meets the eye. Until it wasn't.

Grievous obliterated several jedi despite not having any force powers. Mandalorians were specifically developed to fight Jedi powers and even use lightsabers as weapons. As you say, it's an EU thing; if you take the deleted scene from RotJ Luke doesn't get to even practice with a lightsaber until the skiff fight.

As to her defeating Kylo Ren, I took it as a combination of his being wounded and her literally being shown to give into the power of the Force. Which now makes more sense given that the Force has picked her as the thing to counterbalance both Snoke and Ren.

13 minutes ago, Ran said:

I fully accepted that his being the best bush pilot in the Outer Rim directly translated into space flying skills.

Where was this mentioned in the film? The only quote I remember is Obi-Wan saying "I hear you're not a bad pilot yourself".

13 minutes ago, Ran said:

I see canon includes the idea that his T-16 (the one he'd bull's-eye womp rats with) was made by the same manufacturer as the X-Wings, had similar instrumentation, and was used to train X-Wing pilots. But basically the idea that space flight = planetary flight, works for me. Didn't have a problem with X-Wings swooping and banking and so on either, you know.

(FWIW, Pilots were put into front line squadrons in the U.K., Germany, and Japan at various stages of WWII with little more practical experience than a handful of hours of training. I think the need for pilots was so great during the Battle of Britain that pilots were put in the air with just a dozen hours of training, IIRC. So as long as you expect magical banking spacecraft are pretty much exactly like aircraft, and so training is 1:1, Luke definitely had sufficient training.)

Similarly, peasants were put into the front lines of combat with a couple hours of drilling with a spear.

13 minutes ago, Ran said:

But Rey, who taught her to fly the Millenium Falcon? She's a scavenger living in a hut, so impoverished she trades scrap for food, and yet here she knows how to evasively fly a small freighter through narrow gaps and outmaneuver TIE Fighters. (I gather some book explains it as VR training?) And so she's had time to learn to be an expert hand-to-hand fighter, an ace pilot, an ace mechanic, and stumbles across how to use the Force to cloud minds and grab things at a distance and...

Lets just say that Rey as a character is substantially more skilled than Luke from the get go, while being a penniless, orphaned, self-educated scavenger. Who's also innately super-powerful -- more powerful than Luke! -- in the Force, and starts figuring out how to use it on her lonesome. Apparently. If Luke feels overly gifted, what's Rey? If Luke feels just about right, again, what's Rey?

I guess I don't see Rey as particularly more gifted than Luke or Anakin. Especially Anakin, who can build robots when he's 9 years old, can pilot pod racers, and can obliterate droid starships. Obviously your mileage may vary. Rey made a lot more sense to me as someone who might actually have useful skills compared to Luke, especially since we see her fighting people off and doing well before even dealing with anything regarding force powers.

She's a scavenger who has had 15 years to do nothing but train to fight, repair things and play with her VR console. She's been working on the Falcon for years. She doesn't stumble on how to cloud minds and grab things at a distance - she literally sees another force user doing this and tries it. Again, there's not a single force power that she does that she is not told to do or does not see herself.

But yes, she absolutely is more powerful than Luke is in the Force - because again, her creation is to compensate for Luke's absence and to deal with both Snoke and Ren.

To me this is something of a compelling question - if she's that powerful in the Force, what happens when she defeats Ren? If Ren goes away forever, how does she maintain the balance by herself? Or if Snoke is now gone - does someone come in to give Ren a boost?

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Eh I thought I brought it up before so forgive me if I'm repeating myself but Rey's piloting skills come from an old simulator she has. It's also why she has that helmet, she's basically a giant Luke skywalker fan girl.

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Eh I thought I brought it up before so forgive me if I'm repeating myself but Rey's piloting skills come from an old simulator she has. It's also why she has that helmet, she's basically a giant Luke skywalker fan girl.

I'm honestly okay with her piloting skills being as instinctual as her lightsaber combat. Even in the movie she "doesn't know" how she flew that well.

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I personally felt Akbar should have had Holdo's arc in TLJ. That kamikaze hyperspace jump would have been that much more epic. Especially with his famous line. But who would suspect Akbar of betraying the Resistance? It's the only reason Holdo worked for me in that role. I was waffling on whether she was a traitor or not.

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Yes, Obi Wan used two lines of dialog and Luke is blocking shots blindfolded. Seems like a reasonable thing. In the same way, Ren taught Rey how to do things like force pulls and mind tricks, using almost exactly the same amount of dialog and training.

I've no particular recollection of TFA on this score, so I'll take your word for it. But I'll add that Luke from ANH to TESB, again, goes a couple of years.

10 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Another way to say it is this: every single thing that Rey does using the force she sees someone else do before her, or someone else is explicitly mentoring her on how to do (Luke with the meditation and reaching out as an example). This is not any different than the amount of training Luke gets from Obi-Wan.

Okay, that's cool. Now do it with a rotating turret that you've never used and a targeting computer that was bought from Radio Shack from 1976. Why is it weird that you can do that, but Rey can't fly the Falcon despite tinkering with it for years?

I think a rotating turret for someone who's used to piloting will probably not be weird? I mean, he's not responsible for the whole ship. Just point and shoot...

Pretty sure there are a lot of mechanics in the Air Force who would not be able to fly the planes they work on, in any case. There is no real correspondence between being a mechanic and being a pilot. There is some correspondence in the Star Wars universe between being an aircraft pilot and a space pilot (well, in our universe, too, actually!)

10 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Sure, and I kind of assumed that Rey had played with a piloting simulator. Neither were shown in the movie though, and Luke's only encounter with Raiders gets him knocked hard on his ass.

I forgot he had a blaster rifle musket?) in that scene, actually, which goes to show that he did know how to use one, and it's explicitly shown.

10 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Grievous obliterated several jedi despite not having any force powers. Mandalorians were specifically developed to fight Jedi powers and even use lightsabers as weapons. As you say, it's an EU thing; if you take the deleted scene from RotJ Luke doesn't get to even practice with a lightsaber until the skiff fight.

Luke used his lightsaber to fight Vader in TESB, and had it for a couple of years prior to that point.

10 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

Where was this mentioned in the film? The only quote I remember is Obi-Wan saying "I hear you're not a bad pilot yourself".

Think I remember it from Alan Dean Foster's novelization of ANH, but I see that was based on a filmed scene that wasn't included in the final cut:

There's also the womp rat line which I'm certain was in ANH, and that line's explicit about his shooting stuff while flying his T-16.

10 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

I guess I don't see Rey as particularly more gifted than Luke or Anakin.

She's definitely more gifted than Luke. But if she's more like an Anakin, a Chosen One, maybe that explains it all. Preternatural skill to go with some great destiny.

10 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

She's a scavenger who has had 15 years to do nothing but train to fight, repair things and play with her VR console.

I think generally in the real world, if you're living in desperate, hand-to-mouth conditions, you probably don't have the luxury of going pew-pew in video games.

10 minutes ago, Kalbear said:

To me this is something of a compelling question - if she's that powerful in the Force, what happens when she defeats Ren? If Ren goes away forever, how does she maintain the balance by herself? Or if Snoke is now gone - does someone come in to give Ren a boost?

I'm guessing they're gonna drop the whole balance thing.

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I personally felt Akbar should have had Holdo's arc in TLJ. That kamikaze hyperspace jump would have been that much more epic. Especially with his famous line. But who would suspect Akbar of betraying the Resistance? It's the only reason Holdo worked for me in that role. I was waffling on whether she was a traitor or not.

The whole "Traitor" thing felt pretty tired, and was just filler to give Poe something to do/ transform him from hotshot to humbled leader. Ackbar would have been better, or 3-PO. Anyone notice that the 'red arm' disappeared in the day between TFA and TLJ, with nary a mention? Guess he got it fixed in the handful of hours between this film and the last.

This, of course, indicates one of the fundamental issues with this new trilogy. The OT took place over several years. A lot of the complains / ongoing argument about Rey as "Mary Sue" stem from the terrible, relentless pacing. Between TFA and TLJ what, four days or so have taken place? Within the structure of the film, there's little time for the movies to "breath" or to establish believable character changes (Rose falls for Finn in the space of a day? Why not move that to Ep. IX? Because they are setting up Poe/Rey). Abrams with his relentless audience-pleasing push, and now Johnson with the "slow chase" attempt at generating tension, have resulted in the audience to buy into a lot of drama in a very short period of established time. It has led to ridiculous stuff like Rey and Poe meeting at the end of VIII, Kylo Ren watching the Republic blow up from a ship, then a few minutes later landing at Maz's joint, and so on. It's just an additional strain on credibility within two films already pushing it pretty far.

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Not just the pacing but JJ's "Make It Delightful!" mantra have both hurt the dramatization of the new heroes.

The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi are so desperate not to have Rey lose (unlike Luke, who lost constantly) or need help (unlike Luke, who needed help constantly) that her victories feel relatively weightless and she plays as overpowered even though the "math" doesn't necessarily read that way, but it sure is more delightful watching the hero win than watching them lose.

Similarly, The Force Awakens shortchanged Finn by not allowing him to deal with any of the inherent internal conflict that comes from deserting/defecting and having effectively been a child soldier. Similarly similarly, the relationship with Poe could have been infinitely richer if JJ had had any interest at all in maintaining tension between them as fighters from opposing sides of a conflict who happened to need each other. Characters becoming insta-pals is infinitely less dramatically (or comedically) satisfying than having them butt heads for a while (as happens in the OT) but it sure is delightful. Then The Last Jedi shortchanged Finn by sending him on a sidequest so dull even the magic of John Williams couldn't bring it to life.

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Who taught Rey anything? Who mentored her? No one, apparently. She just starts doing Force stuff because. This post-Lucas Rebels show apparently makes this canonically okay, though, as the Ezra kid apparently is the same. So Rey's not really special in the new canon. Fine. I find it weird, but this may go into HE's commentary of a radical reconceptualization of things for the 21st century, a rejection of knowledge and experience as traditional or conservative constructs.

That's not quite correct. Ezra has a mentor in Kanan who trains him incessantly between episodes and during episodes. It's a crash course in Jedi training and Kanan himself was only a senior padawan who escaped Order 66 (which is how they get around the whole "No Jedi survived" thing), but by the end of Season 3 about 3 years (maybe closer to 4) have passed and Ezra has spent all that time training.

Rebels also firmly establishes that non-Force users can wield lightsabres, with the revelation of the existence of the Darksabre (which was actually in Clone Wars but they retconned it for Rebels), a weapon that Mandalorians are can be trained to use whether they're Force users or not.

It's also worth noting that lightsabres are not weightless. Apparently they can be programmed to simulate weight and balance depending on the wielder's preference (apparently a George Lucas explanation to explain why Obi-Wan and Vader are holding their swords like they're heavy broadswords in Ep 4 and later flying all over the shop with them in the prequels). There's also a line in Rebels about how non-Force users can bond with the lightsabre crystal over time, which helps with the wielding the blade and not chopping your legs off thing (the crystal in the sabre can channel the Force into the user and help them with focus, but it doesn't give them access to any Force skills).

Quote

We still doing the Rey is a marry sue thing? Really?

Well, TLJ reopened the debate on Rey's skills (I'm not calling it by that name because it's stupid). It was assumed that some time would pass between movies and maybe we'd rejoin the action with her and Luke having been training for weeks/months. Then it was assumed that okay, TLJ was picking up straight away and maybe we'd either 1) get a cogent backstory explanation for her skills related to her childhood or 2) there'd be some kind of training montage thing involved. Since that didn't happen there now has to be an explanation of how Rey took down more of Snoke's Praetorian Guard than Kylo Ren - a dude who presumably trained with these very guys for years - despite having almost no more experience than she did at the end of TFA, and having to save Ren when he was effectively defeated by those guys (although it is quite soon after his injuries sustained from Rey at the end of TFA - actually rather remarkably so given how he's healed - so maybe he's still not on top form).

That's a bit more difficult to explain and we can only really fall back on "because of the Force." Which is fine, but again inconsistent with what was established previously (Luke not being able to beat Vader in TESB after 3 years of practice, albeit only against remotes, and possibly only winning in RotJ because Vader deliberately let him, both consistent with his relative lack of experience).

Or to put it another way, the complaints about Rey in TFA were really invalid and easily explained, but in TLJ they become a little more difficult to explain.

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That's not quite correct. Ezra has a mentor in Kanan who trains him incessantly between episodes and during episodes. It's a crash course in Jedi training and Kanan himself was only a senior padawan who escaped Order 66 (which is how they get around the whole "No Jedi survived" thing), but by the end of Season 3 about 3 years (maybe closer to 4) have passed and Ezra has spent all that time training.

Rebels also firmly establishes that non-Force users can wield lightsabres, with the revelation of the existence of the Darksabre (which was actually in Clone Wars but they retconned it for Rebels), a weapon that Mandalorians are can be trained to use whether they're Force users or not.

It's also worth noting that lightsabres are not weightless. Apparently they can be programmed to simulate weight and balance depending on the wielder's preference (apparently a George Lucas explanation to explain why Obi-Wan and Vader are holding their swords like they're heavy broadswords in Ep 4 and later flying all over the shop with them in the prequels). There's also a line in Rebels about how non-Force users can bond with the lightsabre crystal over time, which helps with the wielding the blade and not chopping your legs off thing (the crystal in the sabre can channel the Force into the user and help them with focus, but it doesn't give them access to any Force skills).

Well, TLJ reopened the debate on Rey's skills (I'm not calling it by that name because it's stupid). It was assumed that some time would pass between movies and maybe we'd rejoin the action with her and Luke having been training for weeks/months. Then it was assumed that okay, TLJ was picking up straight away and maybe we'd either 1) get a cogent backstory explanation for her skills related to her childhood or 2) there'd be some kind of training montage thing involved. Since that didn't happen there now has to be an explanation of how Rey took down more of Snoke's Praetorian Guard than Kylo Ren - a dude who presumably trained with these very guys for years - despite having almost no more experience than she did at the end of TFA, and having to save Ren when he was effectively defeated by those guys (although it is quite soon after his injuries sustained from Rey at the end of TFA - actually rather remarkably so given how he's healed - so maybe he's still not on top form).

That's a bit more difficult to explain and we can only really fall back on "because of the Force." Which is fine, but again inconsistent with what was established previously (Luke not being able to beat Vader in TESB after 3 years of practice, albeit only against remotes, and possibly only winning in RotJ because Vader deliberately let him, both consistent with his relative lack of experience).

Or to put it another way, the complaints about Rey in TFA were really invalid and easily explained, but in TLJ they become a little more difficult to explain.

Not for combat. Again, it is established (subtle, but there) that Rey has been practicing martial combat for potentially years.

From a critical standpoint, her use of the staff while training -- in terms of efficient movement, stance, placement, etc. -- is far superior to the flopping around she does with the lightsaber moments later. But maybe she Force bonded during that time?

I don't have issues with that sort of stuff. I have issues with the fact that the movies take place over so short a time, and major, major character evolvement / development occurs in so short a time. I really wish Johnson had spaced this movie out over at least a couple weeks. It would have removed the slow-chase plot, but that was kinda garbage to begin with. Instead, have the First Order relentlessly pursuing the Resistence from base to base, and have Finn/Rose's sidequest be in trying to discover the traitor by venturing to the heart of the war-profiteer's resort, etc. etc. Seriously, this shit writes itself.

But everything has to move fast these days. Can't risk the audience getting bored in these 2-300 million dollar blockbusters. Hence the ridiculous pacing, snark-humor, spectacle for spectacle's sake, etc.

I actually like this movie a lot. It has some of the best sequences of the entire saga. But a full 40-50% of it is dumb and could have been so easily improved upon. Kalbear mentioned ESB as a product of many voices / talents; it went through many drafts and they picked the best of each to craft the only really good film of the serial. With TFA and now TLJ, it feels very first-draft aside from a few key moments.

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Rebels also firmly establishes that non-Force users can wield lightsabres, with the revelation of the existence of the Darksabre (which was actually in Clone Wars but they retconned it for Rebels), a weapon that Mandalorians are can be trained to use whether they're Force users or not.

That was established in Empire Strikes Back when Han used it to make a nice, snug tauntaun sleeping bag.

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I may be mis remembering/just wrong here, but I thought it was established in some of the extra promo material/new EU stuff that Kylo Ren just plain sucks ass with a lightsaber.

1 hour ago, Davrum said:

Not just the pacing but JJ's "Make It Delightful!" mantra have both hurt the dramatization of the new heroes.

The Force Awakens and The Last Jedi are so desperate not to have Rey lose (unlike Luke, who lost constantly) or need help (unlike Luke, who needed help constantly) that her victories feel relatively weightless and she plays as overpowered even though the "math" doesn't necessarily read that way, but it sure is more delightful watching the hero win than watching them lose.

....we still talking about Star Wars?

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Yes, Obi Wan used two lines of dialog and Luke is blocking shots blindfolded. Seems like a reasonable thing. In the same way, Ren taught Rey how to do things like force pulls and mind tricks, using almost exactly the same amount of dialog and training.

Except presumably we only saw part of Luke's training with Kenobi. It seems likely they worked on it en route to Mos Eisley (a journey too long for Luke to be willing to make before his family are killed, made the day after he decides he wants to become a Jedi), and during the trip to Alderaan we see only the tail end of possibly hours of lightsaber practise.

Copying and adapting the techniques of a hostile Force user when you've got no prior experience of any conscious use of the Force is very different from being trained. Especially adapting an attempt at mind reading into mind control without ever seeing mind control demonstrated.

4 hours ago, Kalbear said:

Sure, and I kind of assumed that Rey had played with a piloting simulator.

How could she afford to keep a working simulator, and not trade it in for food? She's living in extreme poverty, and must have bad luck with the scavenging occasionally.

4 hours ago, Kalbear said:

if you take the deleted scene from RotJ Luke doesn't get to even practice with a lightsaber until the skiff fight.

Aside from any practising he did offscreen between constructing the lightsaber and showing up at Jabba's palace. And any practising he did between ANH and ESB, and what we see him do in ESB.

4 hours ago, Kalbear said:

The only quote I remember is Obi-Wan saying "I hear you're not a bad pilot yourself".

Immediately after describing his father as the best star-pilot in the galaxy, ie it's implying that he's inherited his father's natural talent for piloting, to the point that people comment on it. Also:

And "I used to bull's-eye womp rats in my T-16 back home" - ie he has practise reliably shooting small (and probably moving) targets from a flying vehicle, a feat which the other rebel pilots consider impossible. ANH does an excellent job of establishing his exceptional piloting skills before he needs them, and he comes from a background where he can plausibly have learned them.

4 hours ago, Kalbear said:

I guess I don't see Rey as particularly more gifted than Luke or Anakin. Especially Anakin

Anakin was handled terribly as well. I don't think you'll find many people criticising the new films and holding up the Prequels as how Star Wars is supposed to be done.

4 hours ago, Kalbear said:

She's a scavenger who has had 15 years to do nothing but train to fight, repair things and play with her VR console. She's been working on the Falcon for years.

What VR console? And presumably she's spent most of her time scavenging, not playing at anything unnecessary, and while she's picked up some self defense skills out of necessity, it seems unlikely she has any actual combat training (who would have trained her? she doesn't appear to have any friends or allies). The previous experience with the Falcon doesn't fit well with what we're shown of her background before then. It would have been easy for TFA to handle that better; show her with a VR console, establish an actual relationship between her and Unkar at the start, have her ask when they can do another run to deliver a shipment of salvage to his buyers or whatever.

And I'd have much rather seen an Episode 8 that started a year or two after TFA, with Rey getting fed up with her training with Luke and running off to get involved in the Resistance (more potential drama there than having her complete her training and being sent off as a fully trained Jedi with Luke's blessing).

4 hours ago, Kalbear said:

But yes, she absolutely is more powerful than Luke is in the Force - because again, her creation is to compensate for Luke's absence and to deal with both Snoke and Ren.

The balance thing is a pretty awful idea, in my opinion. It doesn't work if the characters have any agency. Someone can be born with a strong affinity for the Force, but whether they choose Light or Dark should be up to them.

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I may be mis remembering/just wrong here, but I thought it was established in some of the extra promo material/new EU stuff that Kylo Ren just plain sucks ass with a lightsaber.

....we still talking about Star Wars?

Probably not if you guys are going to keep bringing up "extra promo material/new EU stuff".

As Master Yoda once said, "Be coherent standing alone a movie should. If to make sense extra promo material/new EU stuff a movie requires, worth less than porg's droppings that movie is."

15 minutes ago, felice said:

The balance thing is a pretty awful idea, in my opinion. It doesn't work if the characters have any agency. Someone can be born with a strong affinity for the Force, but whether they choose Light or Dark should be up to them.

Agree 100%, if not more. The idea that the Force has will undermines the agency of those characters who use it, weakening the story immensely.

It's infinitely more compelling if the Force is as Obi-wan, Yoda and Luke describe it ... simply an energy field between all matter which may be accessed and manipulated by those who have enough talent and application. If the Force has will it becomes a type of god, which blunts the edges of the themes of good and evil, and especially of choosing good over evil, immensely.

The original idea was that the Force would be "balanced" if the Sith could be wiped out. That the Sith were some kind of disease which needed to be removed to achieve harmony in the galaxy. "Balance" was never supposed to mean light side and dark side in equal measure. Who the hell would ever aim for that?